I really screwed up one of my more promising games in FM08. I started off unemployed and got the St Pauli job in the German second division. The minimum expectation was to survive relegation. I acquired my usual set of affordable, young talents who developed well throughout the season and helped me to a 4th place finish (just missing out on promotion unfortunately). Right after the 2008 African Cup, I was offered the Senegal job. We were expected to qualify for the WC with a relatively straightforward group, with the exception of Morocco. We won 3-1 at their place, they won 1-0 at ours, and both teams got maximum points from the other matches. We just about edged them out on head to head. Strangely enough, my first 8 or so goals for Senegal were either scored by S Camara or H Camara. When we finally got our first non-Camara scorer, it turned out to be Diomansy Kamara.
Anyway, St Pauli's season was quite up and down and we ended the in 13th, which was below expectations but well clear of relegation so my job was still very secure. However, I was starting to get quite bored of the German second division by this point and wanted to try my luck elsewhere. I let my contract run out and started applying for any vacant positions. To my horror, I kept being rejected. I must've had over 100 rejections! Granted a fair number of them were for ridiculously good clubs (Arsenal, Valencia, etc) but I was very frustrated and just wanted something. I ended up just sitting out club management in the 3rd season and waited for the 2010 African Cup to start.
We were drawn against Ghana, Mali and Zimbabwe. We had 2 draws and a win. The end result was Mali getting through ahead of us due to a superior goal difference of merely 1 goal. Needless to say I was sacked after the competition was over, which meant I couldn't see the job through to the WC after all that hard work. Really took the piss. And I was unemployed again. I went on holiday until a job was offered. Towards the end of the season, I took the job at Istres, a French second division team, taking over from one Raymond Domenech who had gone on to bigger and better things. The team was in a good position in the league, but I found it really difficult getting into it with just a few games left. There wasn't enough time for me to work out what particular tactics to employ for these players and so on, so it was very frustrating. I ended up quitting and deleting the whole saved game after just 2 matches with Istres.